Curmudgeon Corner not enough, need Utterly Disgusted.

A friend's son lives in rented accommodation along with his partner and 2 children. Boy age 6 and girl age 10. He has been given 6 months notice to vacate as the owner needs to sell the property. As I understand it, this is much longer notice than is actually required by law.

He has been doing his best to find alternative accommodation, but has now approached the local Housing Association as he is struggling to find anywhere.

Their "advice"? Don't move out when the notice expires, wait until they take you to court and go through all the process of getting them evicted. That will take several months thereby giving them longer to find somewhere else! The HA has even suggested that if they do leave at the end of the contract they may be considered to have made themselves homeless, and will not get any help from the HA.

What sort of world are we living in where a body working on behalf of the local council is telling people to ignore contracts. Is it any surprise that there is a shortage of affordable rented housing when that is the advice being given?

The friend's son has absolutely no intention of following that 'advice' but it may mean the family having to split up and live with other family members until they can find suitable accommodation.

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It’s not great, but there is a massive housing shortage and the councils/HAs can’t possibly provide accommodation to everybody who turns up with a section 21. It would be physically impossible.

legally, the landlord giving notice does not end the tenancy, a tenancy can only by ended by either the tenant or the court.

Your son should not put the landlord’s welfare above his children’s, if they have to stay they have to stay, landlords know the laws and rules before they go into business and should be factoring the possibility into their planning. They should of course pay the full rent the whole time they stay.

Hopefully they can can find a new private rental in time, I wish them luck, I wouldn’t want to be renting with a young family, it’s a tough world these days.

Just to clarify, it's not my son - we don't have any children. It just seems wrong to me that a contract can be drawn up, agreed and signed by both parties, but can then simply be ignored. The family have always got on well with the landlord and don't want to sh** on them from a great height, particularly as there is a genuine reason for needing (not just wanting) to sell the property.

Just to clarify, it's not my son - we don't have any children. It just seems wrong to me that a contract can be drawn up, agreed and signed by both parties, but can then simply be ignored. The family have always got on well with the landlord and don't want to sh** on them from a great height, particularly as there is a genuine reason for needing (not just wanting) to sell the property.

Sorry, misread!

Housing is in a mess, they have my sympathies. The contract can’t override the law though, a section 21 notice is notice that the landlord plans to go to court to gain possession of the property. It does not require the tenant to leave, although most do if they can, nobody wants to go through the eviction process. Hopefully they can find somewhere before it comes to that.

blame Thatcher for selling off the council houses. Election bribe for one generation but everyone thereafter has been at the mercy of private landlords.

She started it, but no subsequent government of any colour has stopped it.

Nor have they re-instated free school milk, despite the outrage they all expressed when she abolished it. But then, they have only had 48 years to think about it. I don't suppose this is in any way connected with the chronic decline in dairy farming.